Large shrub possesses host of medicinal properties that Native Americans have tapped for centuries

Story ran on Malibu Times Blog, May 17, 2013

Many Pacific plants have tremendous compounds to ward off fungal and bacterial infections. There may, however, be none stronger than coastal Pacific devil’s club.

Devil’s club is a rather prehistoric looking single-stemmed plant covered head-to-toe in armor with three-quarter-inch spines on its stem, leaf base and leaves. Its spine will cause severe skin irritation. It can grow 20 feet high with 14-inch leaves resembling a big leaf maple. It has small whitish flowers and reproduces from bright red berries or root layering, which is a natural form of clonal propagation.

Devil’s club occurs throughout the Pacific Northwest on moist, but well drained, rich forested ecosystems. It’s a member of the same family as Asian and Siberian ginseng, but does not contain similar ginsenosides or the active compounds as its cousins do. Devil’s club does, on the other hand, have potent properties to successfully combat antifungal, antiviral, antibacterial and antimycobacterial agents. That’s why it is being tested to combat Esherichia coli, Staphyloccus aureus and Bacillius subtilis.

Native Americans have known about devil’s club and its other properties for thousands of years. They revere this plant, and for good reason, for both medicinal and spiritual applications. In fact, they used the inner stem bark to treat over 34 different physical ailments including broken bones, type II diabetes and cancers. Whole stems, berries, leaves and roots contain active compounds to boost the human immune system.

Native Americans believe that devil’s club protects them against supernatural entities, epidemics and evil influences. During certain ceremonies the extract of the red berries is painted on shaman’s faces. It is said to fill them with supernatural powers.

Devil’s club has been illegally marketed as Alaskan ginseng. Commercially available tinctures, teas and capsules that contain devil’s club extract are harvested from roots. Some producers unfortunately are trying to take advantage of false ginseng properties which, by the way, only come from roots.

Devil’s club is harvested from wild plants. It is difficult to cultivate and presently there are no commercial cultivations producing the plant.

Harvesting roots from wild stock for commercial use kills plants and is not a sustainable practice.

Currently devil’s club is being tested for treatment of tuberculosis and AIDS. Its many medicinal properties make it an exciting plant which potentially will offer hope to those afflicted with dreadful diseases.

Wild forests are filled with exquisite webs of life, and devil’s club, which is an indicator of a rich, fertile site is proof that our diverse temperate Pacific forests contain more than just giant, old trees that are the finest carbon dioxide warehouse to have ever evolved on planet Earth.

It is time to protect our ancient forests and their medicines; a moratorium on harvesting all remaining ancient forests in America must occur now.

Elephants grieve at the death of conservationist Lawrence Anthony, South Africa

Australia, Radio 1, National: Ockham’s Razor

Australia, Radio 1, National, Overnight: Superstorm Sandy

Australia, Radio 1, National, Overnight: Bees and our Environment

Australia, Radio 1, National, Overnight: Great Barrier reef in Trouble

Australia, Radio 1, National, Overnight: Protecting our Oceans

Save the Oceans

Oceans Dying

Bees helping humankind

Save our Florida corals

Operation Bee founder testimonial

Earth Dr Reese Halter is an award-winning broadcaster and distinguished biologist. His latest books are The Insatiable Bark Beetle and The Incomparable Honeybee

Contact Earth Dr Reese Halter

Text © by Dr Reese Halter 2013. All rights reserved.

Story ran on Huffington Post April 5, 2013

The brutal ‘War Against Nature’ has nearly annihilated the Sumatran and Borneo elephants. And the prime culprit causing habitat loss is the rapacious and insatiable Indonesian palm oil plantation industry.

In addition to the corruption, which is rife throughout Indonesia’s protected forests – poachers have also slaughtered the elephants for their tusks feeding the burgeoning international ivory market.

Over the past year in excess of 18 Sumatran elephants have been murdered. On the island of Borneo a similar story is playing out with the critically endangered pygmy elephants. It is heartbreaking to watch a pygmy elephant calf mourn the loss of its mother in the Gunug Rara Forest Reserve.

Last month in Sydney, Australia, Leif Cocks, founder of The Orangutan Project and Project Leader Alex Mobrucker launched the International Elephant Project to help save the remaining wild Sumatran and Borneo elephants utilizing effective elephant conservation actions.

There’s less than 1,600 Sumatran elephants and about 1,000 Borneo pygmy elephants left on the globe. This is an epic crisis and these awesome animals are loosing their habitat in many cases due to illegal palm oil plantations.

The goal of the International Elephant Project is for the remaining elephants to live in the wild with their herds, and coexist peacefully with the indigenous peoples.

Please support the International Elephant Project they need help – now!

Australia, Radio 1, National: Ockham’s Razor

Australia, Radio 1, National, Overnight: Superstorm Sandy

Australia, Radio 1, National, Overnight: Bees and our Environment

Australia, Radio 1, National, Overnight: Great Barrier reef in Trouble

Australia, Radio 1, National, Overnight: Protecting our Oceans

Save the Oceans

Oceans Dying

Bees helping humankind

Save our Florida corals

Operation Bee founder testimonial

Earth Dr Reese Halter is an award-winning broadcaster and distinguished biologist. His latest books are The Insatiable Bark Beetle and The Incomparable Honeybee

Contact Earth Dr Reese Halter

Text © by Dr Reese Halter 2013. All rights reserved.

From Australian Broadcasting Corporation’s The Drum January 4, 2013

In the 20th century humans slaughtered 1.5 million whales. It’s time now to end the whale hunt and The War Against Nature, writes Earth Dr Reese Halter.

Four Japanese whaling boats have once again set sail for the Southern Ocean Whale Sanctuary. And four Sea Shepherd Conservation Society boats with 120 crew representing 26 nations are waiting to intercept and stop them.

It is without a doubt the most courageous and perhaps meaningful fight in The War Against Nature as the new year of 2013 commences.

This year the stakes are at an all-time high as the Japanese have armed coast guards on their boats, and a recent ruling by the US Court of Appeals stated that Sea Shepherd boats are to remain at least 500 yards from whaling vessels.

Led by their founder Paul Watson the Sea Shepherd has recently added a new fourth vessel – in a twist of fate, buying a former Japanese meteorological research boat with a gift from Sam Simon, one of the creators of the television cartoon series The Simpsons. And the Sea Shepherd has just appointed Dr Bob Brown, a long-time environmental champion and former Greens leader to their Australian board of directors. With two helicopters and three aerial drones, their largest-ever battle has daring goals: Zero Tolerance: Zero Cruelty: Zero Kills.

Later this year at the International Court of Justice in The Hague, Australia and New Zealand’s charges against Japanese whaling will be heard and ruled upon. But before that Sea Shepherd activists will fight to protect nature, in an effort to end an antiquated, senseless, unnecessary and cruel blood-lusting hunt.

The fact that the Japanese old guard is displaying a sense of entitlement to enter a whale sanctuary and perform lethal research under the auspice of scientific research is repugnant.

Little (if any) credible whale research has been conducted or released over the past quarter of a century by the Institute of Cetacean Research in Japan. By the way, they did not attend the Symposium of Living Whales in the Southern Ocean last year in Puerto Varas, Chile, where researchers gathered and compared notes on non-lethal research. Nor were scientists from the Institute of Cetacean Research involved in last year’s finding that humpback whales sing while they multitask e.g. during feeding or breeding, or whale research that showed eating right is the key to both whale, dolphin and human survival.

Not only do the Japanese illegally hunt whales in an international sanctuary feigning meaningful scientific research, they sell the whale meat into the marketplace.

Since 2006 the demand for whale meat has fallen off dramatically, so much so that by 2008 several tons of whale meat were unwanted by the market and placed in cold storage.

In 2011, 88 per cent of Japanese polled had not bought whale meat for at least a year. As if this weren’t enough credence to end the persecution of southern whales the Japanese whaling industry is subsidised to the tune of $US6 million a year, and siphoned $US29 million from the March 2011 (tsunami) Earthquake Recovery Fund.

Over the past two years the Sea Shepherd activists sent the whalers home with a fraction of their quotas. During the last eight years the intervening actions of the Sea Shepherd havespared the lives of over 4,000 southern whales.

As a conservation biologist and concerned citizen I applaud the Sea Shepherd interventions and note that whales around the globe have the right to live on our blue planet just as much as any other living creature including humans.

We need the whales because they are showing scientists how quickly global warming is occurring, helping to determine the extent of the hole in the ozone layer; and, since 40 per cent of the ocean’s phytoplankton is missing from warming ocean temperatures and ocean acidification (from absorbing rising levels of CO2), the whales are crucial in their role to fertilise the oceans and replenish phytoplankton – the base of the entire marine food web.

Researchers from the Zoological Society of London and Queen Mary University found that the whales from the Gulf of California showed the hole in the ozone layer was getting worse, allowing lethal UV radiation to penetrate Earth’s protective ozone shield and causing skin cancers and cataracts.

Researchers from Harvard University and the University of Vermont have found that humpback whales in the Gulf of Maine carry massive quantities of nitrogen from the deep sea where they feed to the surface and release it in their liquid-like faeces. Essentially, humpbacks function as an “upward biological pump.”

It turns out that humpbacks contribute more nitrogen to the Gulf of Maine than all the local rivers combined, an estimated 25,000 metric tons, annually.

In turn, these nutrients allow more phytoplankton to grow which increases the food supply at the base of the marine food web therefore promoting bigger fisheries and higher abundance where whales occur in greater densities.

Clearly, it is erroneous, as the Japanese tout, that whales compete with their commercial fisheries; rather, they enhance them.

Lastly, the iconic, spiralled tooth narwhals, permanent residences of the high Arctic possess brains-to-body sizes just slightly smaller than humans. These extraordinary beauties of a beast dive greater than 1.6 kilometres in pitch-dark icy Arctic water, relying upon echolocation or sonar to hunt, only during the winter, Greenland halibut. They spend up to three hours a day at least a half a mile from the surface, exquisitely adapted to over 80 atmospheres of pressure.

Oceanographers from the University of Washington and Greenland’s Institute of Natural Resources tagged 14 adult narwhals with sensors and determined that the temperature of the Arctic Ocean was almost 1 degree Celsius warmer than previously thought.

In the 20th century humans slaughtered 1.5 million whales. The Sea Shepherds have stood up for whales. This year I predict The Hague will rule against Japanese entitlement and stop senseless whale slaughtering.

In 2008, 13 million people from 119 countries paid $2.1 billion to see the whales. Around the globe, whale watching tourism is growing at 10 per cent per annum. It’s time now to end the whale hunt and The War Against Nature – grant amnesty to magnificent creatures that are helping us survive on our blue planet.

Australia, Radio 1, National: Ockham’s Razor

Australia, Radio 1, National, Overnight: Superstorm Sandy

Australia, Radio 1, National, Overnight: Bees and our Environment

Australia, Radio 1, National, Overnight: Great Barrier reef in Trouble

Australia, Radio 1, National, Overnight: Protecting our Oceans

Save the Oceans

Oceans Dying

Bees helping humankind

Save our Florida corals

Operation Bee founder testimonial

Earth Dr Reese Halter is an award-winning broadcaster and distinguished biologist. His latest books are The Insatiable Bark Beetle and The Incomparable Honeybee

Contact Earth Dr Reese Halter

Text © by Dr Reese Halter 2013. All rights reserved.

California Lutheran University student assessment of earth Dr Reese Halter's Natureal Resources class circa 2010

Story ran on Huffington Post December 27, 2012

This year (2012) more than ever I am encouraged by all the positive emails that I’ve received from around the globe – thank you. I firmly believe that our species has begun to reunite economics and ecology for a sustainable future.

Here are just a few examples of environmental triumphs that we can all celebrate from 2012:

This year Professor Matt King of the University of Tasmania dispelled climate deniers by revealing that 190 million metric tons of ice a day have been melting from Antarctica – that’s the equivalent of 1.5 million blue whales in volume a day – or more than a half a billion blue whales worth of ice turning to water a year. In fact, both Antarctica and the Arctic are warming at least two times faster than the rest of the globe.

This year Australia – the largest coke coal producer in the world – brought into effect a carbon tax. And if they can do it, so too can every other nation on the globe.

Australia has also committed to creating the world’s largest network of marine parks. Australia is providing international leadership on protecting Earth’s oceans. Five main zones along offshore waters will surround every state and territory in their nation.

For the past four years I have written many articles suporting the research that neonictinoids are lethal to honey-, stingless-, bumble- and solitary-bees – yet most of the world including America and Canada still allow these poisons to be applied even though the residual toxicity lasts both in soils and water for up to a decade. This year Australia has a nationwide injunction in situ as scientists review all neonictinoids.

Earlier this year, off the coast of Malibu in a small dingy, my Chesapeake Bay retriever and I spent a surreal half hour next to a majestic blue whale. These creatures are awesome. Whales are helping scientists understand rapid climate change. Statistics from 2008 showed that 13 million people from 119 countries paid $2.1 billion to see the whales. Whale watching is growing at 10 percent per annum. It is time once and for all to end the whale hunt, and grant amnesty to these magnificent creatures. In 2012, the Sea Shepherd Conservation Society continued to lead a worldwide campaign against Japan to stop senselessly slaughtering whales. Kudos.

In May of this year Dr James Hansen, director of NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies and author of Storms of my Grandchildren did the math and presented the outcome of exploiting and burning oil deposits from the Albertan oil sands. He estimated that between 20 and 50 percent of Earth’s species would be driven to extinction. Sea levels will rise and destroy all coastal cities. In the meantime, semi-permanent droughts will become the normal across western United States including the semi-arid region from North Dakota to Texas, and when rains occur they’ll be extreme events – fraught with intense flooding.

And for those who think fracking is the short-term solution to our energy problems – think again. A University of Cornell study lead by Dr Michelle Bamberger examined 24 cases of farmers’ cattle in 6 shale states and found that livestock and domesticated pets exposed to fracking fluids suffered from neurological, reproductive and gastrointestinal illnesses.

Bill McKibben is leading the charge for climate activism across our nation and 350.org has its target firmly set on college investments – taking a page out of pushing universities to stop investing in apartheid-era South Africa during the 1980s. What does your college investment portfolio contain? Please ask your alma mater to divest of all oil, gas, and coal companies.

Kudos to the Arctic Methane Emergency Group (AMEG) headquartered in London for bringing worldwide attention to the vast methane deposits currently locked by the weight of the frozen ice underneath the Arctic’s continental shelf, and their foresight for proposing an innovative geo-engineering solution of pumping seawater spray into the atmosphere to create white clouds, mimicking the missing sea ice, to help cool-off a warming Earth.

This spring we experienced the assault of climate disruption on our fruit and sugar maple trees across the northeast. It devastated apple, grapes, peaches, apricots and other fruits in addition to tainting the 2012 maple syrup crop. And this year, Yale University reported that 70 percent of Americans now say that they firmly believe in global warming – the highest percentage ever recorded.

Colleges and Universities, cities and towns, and corporate America are providing necessary climate leadership, creating jobs and helping to reduce their carbon and water footprints. Climate change is also a citizen’s issue – that means we are all required to lend a helping hand.

I particularly enjoyed covering the giant turbine wind kites – imagine 300 massive kites can easily provide green energy to power the entire city of Los Angeles. Clearly, innovation is what humans do best.

The Obama Administration deserves recognition for opening up 285,000 acres of public land in October for large-scale solar power plants; creating 17 new solar energy zones in California, Nevada, Arizona, Utah, Colorado and New Mexico.

A couple weeks ago the Energy Department announced $28 million funding for seven offshore wind projects including one on Lake Erie. These projects will generate 200,000 jobs; $70 billion in annual investments in the coming decades and generate 4,000 megawatts of green energy – the equivalent to five mid-sized coal fire power plants.

And finally, for those who doubt that humans are exceptional tool-makers and problem solvers I’d like to introduce you to Izhar Gafni an Israeli inventor who dreamt of creating a transportation ‘game changer’ in Africa. He’s perfected a bicycle made almost entirely of cardboard, it costs between $9 and $12 to manufacture. This remarkable 20-pound invention can support riders up to 485 pounds.

We have a lot to be grateful for from our environmental wins in 2012 — and we’ve only just begun!

Australia, Radio 1, National, Overnight: Superstorm Sandy

Australia, Radio 1, National, Overnight: Bees and our Environment

West Coast Truth, Radio: State of our Bees

Australia, Radio 1, National, Overnight: Great Barrier reef in Trouble

Australia, Radio 1, National, Overnight: Protecting our Oceans

Australia, Radio 1, National: Ockham’s Razor

Save the Oceans

Oceans Dying

Bees helping humankind

Save our Florida corals

Operation Bee founder testimonial

Earth Dr Reese Halter is an award-winning broadcaster and distinguished biologist. His latest books are The Insatiable Bark Beetle and The Incomparable Honeybee

Contact Earth Dr Reese Halter

Text © by Dr Reese Halter 2012. All rights reserved.

Story ran on Malibu Times Blog May 10, 2013

The oldest trees on Earth having been growing since before the construction of the pyramids and the advent of the written word.

The sedimentary White Mountains of east central California are home to the world’s oldest living trees – the venerable Great Basin bristlecone pines. Some of these trees have witnessed 1.6 million sunrises.

It seems fitting that the oldest trees on Earth should be living on layers of rock that started as sand and mud or shells deposited on the bottom of a shallow, warm sea 600 million years ago.

The White Mountains are the second-highest in California next to the Sierra Nevadas and the third-highest peak at 14,246 feet above sea level. Being located just east of the Sierras means that the White Mountains are dry. Most of the scant precipitation falls as snow, the remainder comes as isolated thunderstorms. From November to April the climate is inhospitable, with 100 mile-per-hour winds occurring frequently.

At two miles above sea level the ultraviolet radiation is extreme. July and August are the hottest months, with average temperatures rarely exceeding 50 degrees (F) and precipitation is a meager 12 inches per year.

Yet despite these harsh conditions, Great Basin bristlecone pines not only stand upright but thrive where no other of their race of 80,000 species can exist.

These remarkable trees eek out an existence not for just hundreds of years, nor a thousand years, but almost 5,000 years. The oldest known tree on planet Earth lives here. He’s called Methuselah.

He’s older than the pyramids; he’s older than writing; he’s older than the first written story; in fact he was already old as the first pyramid was being constructed.

How are bristlecone pines able to live for so long? They epitomize the word thrifty. They grow for only 45 days a year and very slowly. They produce copious amounts of gooey pitch that protects them from insects and deadly fungus. They continue growing for hundreds and possibly a thousand years even when 80 percent of their bark is removed—and they still produce viable seeds. Fire does not occur in these forests because there is little wood on the floor to burn. They live for so long that the soil beneath erodes away—they outgrow their sites.

As tree scientists learn the secrets of longevity, these exquisite Great Basin bristlecone pines will surely enable humans the opportunity, should they choose, to live longer.

Bristlecone pine trees and their rings are very sensitive to rainfall, and they accurately record past climates dating back, continuously, 8,700 years.

Scientists have found unprecedented Great Basin bristlecone pine tree ring growth since the mid-1950s, compared with the previous 3,500 years. This coincides with temperatures rising 3.6 degrees across the western mountains. Over the past three and a half millennia, none of the tree-ring growth matches what has occurred over the past five and a half decades.

Global warming is extremely dangerous for these ultimate mountaintop specialists of our planet, as they only know how to make haste slowly.

These extraordinary trees—“The Ancient Ones”—are facing an uncertain future, which contradicts their role as the gatekeepers to the Holy Grail: the secret to external life.

Australia, Radio 1, National: Ockham’s Razor

Australia, Radio 1, National, Overnight: Superstorm Sandy

Australia, Radio 1, National, Overnight: Bees and our Environment

Australia, Radio 1, National, Overnight: Great Barrier reef in Trouble

Australia, Radio 1, National, Overnight: Protecting our Oceans

Save the Oceans

Oceans Dying

Bees helping humankind

Save our Florida corals

Operation Bee founder testimonial

Earth Dr Reese Halter is an award-winning broadcaster and distinguished biologist. His latest books are The Insatiable Bark Beetle and The Incomparable Honeybee

Contact Earth Dr Reese Halter

Text © by Dr Reese Halter 2013. All rights reserved.

Story ran on Malibu Times Blog April 26, 2013

Imagine the most perfect tree on Earth: one that outdoes all others in magnificence, size, height, productivity, habitat, architecture and ability to draw thousands of gallons of water. Imagine, too, it is marvelously resistant to drought, fire, insects, disease, mudslides, flooding and wind, with exquisite biodiversity in its crown. Then, and only then, as John Muir put it, “you’d know the coastal monarch of their race” — the immortal Sequoia sempervirens, otherwise known as the coastal redwood.

Redwoods’ direct lineage can be traced back 144 million years ago to the beginning of the Cretaceous Period. That’s when Tyrannosaurus Rex was beginning to rule for 40 million years as no reptile nor animal has ever done since.

Redwoods are unique for many reasons. They are able to reproduce from both seed and organs, called lignotubers, located at the base of the tree just beneath the soil. No other conifer possesses this dual reproduction mechanism. It’s a trait that is widespread among the more advanced race of trees, the broadleaves or angiosperms, some 80 million years after the redwoods were born.

The tallest living tree on planet Earth is a coastal redwood measured at 379.3 feet high, and still growing. That’s twice the size of the Statue of Liberty, and the equivalent of a 38-story skyscraper. That tree was probably born when Jesus Christ walked the earth. It carries well over a billion needles—enough to cover one football field.

Redwoods store thousands of gallons of water, so in the summer months they never run dry. Consequently, they usually grow about 11 months of the year.

The wood doesn’t contain gooey pitch like spruce, pine, fir and larch, so it doesn’t burn easily. The fibrous foot-thick bark is an excellent insulator. In the northern range, fire frequencies are in the order of 700 to 800 years. The bark is high in tannic acid and the wood is full of essential oils, called terpenes, which make it rot resistant.

Though insects do infest redwoods, none can kill a mature tree by themselves.

Coastal redwoods have survived climate change, geologic upheavals and ice ages. Today they exist along a narrow strip of land 475 miles in length reaching from southwest Oregon to Big Sur, Calif.

Adapting to their environment enables redwoods to live for at least two thousand years, with abilities such as drawing water out of fog so they can continue to grow during summer dry periods. Sadly, climate change has reduced the number of summer fog days and the southern end of the range—the trees have begun to migrate, northward.

The real story occurs in the treetops, where redwoods can sprout a forest above a forest. Redwoods are capable of branch-to-branch, branch to trunk, and trunk-to-trunk fusions. Tree scientists think this is in response to mechanical damage and the insatiable ability to constantly seek more light in order to make more food.

These canopy-top grafts become sources to store and share water and nutrients and they stabilize the tree’s crown during storms. The enormous treetops also promote biodiversity. For example, there are 500-year-old saturated fern mats the size of a large mini van, weighing over 500 pounds, all suspended 200 feet above the ground in redwood treetops.

Of 80,000 tree species on Earth, there seems little question Muir was correct — regal redwoods indeed rule the coast.

Australia, Radio 1, National: Ockham’s Razor

Australia, Radio 1, National, Overnight: Superstorm Sandy

Australia, Radio 1, National, Overnight: Bees and our Environment

Australia, Radio 1, National, Overnight: Great Barrier reef in Trouble

Australia, Radio 1, National, Overnight: Protecting our Oceans

Save the Oceans

Oceans Dying

Bees helping humankind

Save our Florida corals

Operation Bee founder testimonial

Earth Dr Reese Halter is an award-winning broadcaster and distinguished biologist. His latest books are The Insatiable Bark Beetle and The Incomparable Honeybee

Contact Earth Dr Reese Halter

Text © by Dr Reese Halter 2013. All rights reserved.

“If it’s wrong to wreck the climate, it’s wrong to profit from that wreckage.” That’s the slogan of the Fossil Free Movement, a campaign started by Bill McKibben and 350.org to persuade “educational and religious institutions, city and state governments, and other institutions that serve the public good” to divest from fossil fuels.

Naomi Klein is also involved in the campaign. In an article this week in The Nation, she points out that there’s one more target missing from the list. Believe it or not, that missing target is environmental organisations. No wonder the campaign missed them off the list. It’s a no brainer. Isn’t it?

Well, no. Some of the biggest environmental organisations in the world invest in fossil fuel companies. By a remarkable coincidence, the same environmental organisations are amongst the biggest promoters of REDD as a carbon trading mechanism. The Nature Conservancy. Conservation International. WWF. Environmental Defense Fund. Wildlife Conservation Society. Meanwhile think tanks such as the World Resources Institute, the Woods Hole Research Center and the Union of Concerned Scientists also invest in fossil fuel companies.

In her article, Klein points out that not all environmental organisations are involved in this scandal. By another remarkable coincidence, these organisations do not promote REDD as a carbon trading mechanism. Greenpeace, 350.org, Friends of the Earth, Rainforest Action Network, Oil Change International and the Climate Reality Project, do not invest in the stock market and either don’t accept corporate funding or place such onerous restrictions on funding that extractive industries are ruled out.

It’s interesting to see how the environmental organisations that profit from their investments in fossil fuel corporations reacted when Klein asked them about their investments and policies. The Nature Conservancy and Wildlife Conservation Society “completely refused to answer any of my questions or provide any further details about its holdings or policies”, Klein writes.

As Klein points out, it’s no wonder that The Nature Conservancy doesn’t have any qualms about profiting from the fossil fuel sector:

[I]n 2010, The Washington Post reported that TNC “has accepted nearly $10 million in cash and land contributions from BP and affiliated corporations”; it counts BP, Chevron, ExxonMobil and Shell among the members of its Business Council; Jim Rogers, CEO of Duke Energy, one of the largest US coal-burning utilities, sits on its board of directors; and it runs various conservation projects claiming to “offset” the carbon emissions of oil, gas and coal companies.

The message from the divest campaign to Big Green is clear: “cut your ties with the fossils, or become one yourself”.

In addition to the article in The Nation, Klein has also produced a list of the environmental groups that are investing in fossil fuels.

The following are the environmental organisations and think tanks that invest in fossil fuels and promote REDD as a carbon trading mechanism, extracted from Klein’s list. Klein’s question in the headline is the right one under the circumstances. But there’s another question. Why on earth were environmental organisations investing in fossil fuels in the first place?

Is it really a coincidence that these organisations invest in fossil fuels and promote trading REDD credits to offset continued emissions in the global North? Of course not. It’s the logical conclusion of the sloppy thinking behind carbon trading.

The Nature Conservancy Endowment: $950 million Investments in publicly traded securities: $1.4 billion

What we know:                                                                                                                                                                                                                                     

• Refused to answer any questions or to provide any details about its holdings or policies
• Financial statements reveal it has at least $22.8 million invested in the energy sector
• Has relationships with fossil fuel companies including: BP, Chevron, ExxonMobil and Shell

Considering divestment?

• No comment

Conservation International Endowment: $25.8 million[1] Investments in publicly traded securities: $22 million

What we know:                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                      

• Does not have any environmental screens on investments
• ”We do not have any explicit policy prohibiting investment in energy companies.” Patricia Yakabe Malentaqui, Spokesperson
• Has relationships with fossil fuel companies including: BP, Chevron, ExxonMobil and Shell

Considering divestment?

• No comment

World Wildlife Fund Endowment: $195 million Investments in publicly traded securities: $75 million

What we know:

• Refused to answer questions about whether it applies environmental screens to its mixed-asset funds
• “We don’t have direct investments, so we do not hold shares of any companies directly. Our investments are primarily through diversified funds.” Ian Morrison, Spokesperson

Considering divestment?

• ”We are interested in the issue you’ve raised and are actively engaged in our own internal discussions in this area.” Ian Morrison, Spokesperson

Environmental Defense Fund Endowment: $5.6 million Investments in publicly traded securities: $34.6 million

What we know:

• Did not disclose status of mixed assets, claiming information is “not public”
• No direct investments in fossil fuel companies: ”EDF does not own any equities or corporate bonds of fossil fuel companies.” Tony Kreindler, Spokesperson
• Working with Shell, Chevron, and other energy companies to promote “sustainable” fracking

Considering divestment?

• ”No, since we don’t own any equities or corporate bonds of fossil fuel companies.” Tony Kreindler, Spokesperson[2]

Wildlife Conservation Society Endowment: $377 million Investments in publicly traded securities: $36.3 million

What we know:

• Refused to answer any questions or to provide any details about its holdings or policies
• Has a subcategory of investments that includes “energy, mining, oil drilling, and agricultural businesses.”
• Partnered with Hess oil company

Considering divestment?

• No comment

Union of Concerned Scientists Endowment: N/A Investments in publicly traded securities: $30 million (Note: This is the current value of UCS’ “Board reserve” fund, which includes, but may not all be invested in, publicly traded securities)

What we know:

• Does not appear to screen managed fund investments for fossil fuels
• On $30 million “Board reserve”: “The reserve is invested in a variety of managed funds, and we are not directly invested with individual companies.” Cheryl Schaffer, Director of Finance & Administration
• From UCS’ investment policy: “In its choice of investments and of investment managers the Finance Committee will consider the broad environmental mission of UCS seeking to balance the need for strong financial performance with sustainable and responsible investment choices. The Finance Committee will attempt to seek investment managers that apply high ethical standards to their work.”

Considering divestment?

• “UCS has not yet discussed joining the divestment campaign.” —Cheryl Schaffer, Director of Finance & Administration

Woods Hole Research Center Endowment: $4.2 million Investments in publicly traded securities: $4.8 million

What we know:

• Investments are managed in accord with “social guidelines” for investing. “Those guidelines do not necessarily exclude all investments in all fossil fuel companies, but, in practice, none of the major multinational coal or oil companies pass their filter and their scoring system.”
• ”Firms must fall in the top quartile of their ranking process in order to be considered for investment.  There are some small companies with interests in fossil fuel industries that do.” Eric A. Davidson, WHRC President and Senior Scientist

Considering divestment?

• “We have recently learned that [our investment management firm] Trillium is offering its clients a new option of a fossil fuel free investment portfolio.  We are beginning to study that option, but are just in the early stages of that analysis.” Eric A. Davidson, WHRC President and Senior Scientist

World Resources Institute Endowment: $38 million Investments in publicly traded securities: $13 million

What we know:

• Refused to answer questions about whether or not it is invested in fossil fuels
• According to WRI investment policy: “In line with our mission, WRI is obligated to include [Environmental, Social, Governance] investment options when selecting new asset managers. We do not target a given percent of our investment allocation to ESG.”
• According to WRI investment policy: “Our investments support our mission and should be aligned with our mission and values such that we are not investing in companies/instruments that are less than fully transparent or insensitive to environmental or developmental issues.”
• Has “strategic relationship” with Shell Foundation, among other corporate relationships

Considering divestment?

• No comment

[1] Endowment/investment numbers confirmed by each organization or taken from most recent available IRS Form 990s or audited financial statements

[2] Under US law, nonprofits are not required to divulge their holdings in the stock market. Every group mentioned was asked to provide that information; no group did. And for this reason, we are unable to independently verify that any group is fully divested.

Story ran on Huffington Post April 30, 2013

The Arctic sea ice is melting at a phenomenal rate and the London-based Arctic Methane Emergency Group (AMEG) is calling for governments to put two and two together, and pull out all stops to save the Arctic sea ice or humankind will face starvation in the ensuing years ahead.

This week, the White House will hear evidence from Australian scientist, Carlos Duarte, that the Arctic sea ice is on such a downward spiral that we may see a dramatic decline of sea ice over the next two years. Evidence was given to the UK government last year from British scientists, Peter Wadhams and John Nissen, that we could see minimal sea ice by September 2015, simply extrapolating the sea ice volume trend. Evidence from recent satellite images suggests that a record melt is in progress this year. The plight of the Arctic was highlighted to British MPs and the Met Office in a recent showing of the film “Chasing Ice” at the House of Commons, London. The Arctic has recently become an issue in the European Parliament.

Research from US scientist, Dr Jennifer Francis, suggests that the retreat of sea ice is causing a disruption of jet stream behavior, producing weather extremes. Evidence was given to the UK government last year that the weather extremes being experienced in the UK and elsewhere could be due to this disruption of weather systems as the Arctic warms relative to the tropics. This evidence was reported by Robin McKie in the Observer, on 7th April in an article entitled: “Why our turbulent weather is getting harder to predict”. The weather extremes from last year are causing real problems for farmers, not only in the UK, but in US and many grain-producing countries. World food production can be expected to decline, with mass starvation inevitable. AMEG predicts that the price of food will rise inexorably, producing global unrest and making food security even more of a heightened issue.

Putting these two strands of evidence together, it is obvious that we face an ever worsening food crisis unless something dramatic is done straightaway to cool the Arctic and save the Arctic sea ice. This sounds impossible, but can be done. AMEG believes the best chance of success in cooling the Arctic quickly involves cloud cooling techniques, such as being developed by engineers Stephen Salter in the UK and Aaron Franklin in New Zealand. Salter’s technique could be deployed almost immediately.

Chair of AMEG John Nissen says “scientists acknowledge that the Arctic sea ice is a key component of the Earth’s temperature and climate control system. I fear that civilisation may not survive the abrupt climate change and other catastrophes which will be unleashed by late-summer disappearance of Arctic sea ice, likely within two or three years, so it is imperative that rapid action is taken to cool the Arctic sufficiently to prevent this disappearance – no doubt the most vital engineering challenge ever faced by mankind.”

Clearly the time for action is now.

Australia, Radio 1, National: Ockham’s Razor

Australia, Radio 1, National, Overnight: Superstorm Sandy

Australia, Radio 1, National, Overnight: Bees and our Environment

Australia, Radio 1, National, Overnight: Great Barrier reef in Trouble

Australia, Radio 1, National, Overnight: Protecting our Oceans

Save the Oceans

Oceans Dying

Bees helping humankind

Save our Florida corals

Operation Bee founder testimonial

Earth Dr Reese Halter is an award-winning broadcaster and distinguished biologist. His latest books are The Insatiable Bark Beetle and The Incomparable Honeybee

Contact Earth Dr Reese Halter

Text © by Dr Reese Halter 2013. All rights reserved.

Story ran on Malibu Times Blog April 12, 2013

Honeybees are in serious trouble. 2013 overwinter death rates ranged from 40 to 90 percent across the U.S. and its 2.4 million commercial beehives. The American Honey Producers Association’s beekeeper of the year, Darren Fox of Cache County, Utah, reported losing 70 percent of his hives this past winter.

Beekeepers around the globe are all saying the same thing: Neonicotinoids (a group of insecticides) are wiping their bees out. The EPA is being sued by farmers and the following groups: Beyond Pesticides, the Center for Food Safety, the Pesticide Action Network North America, the Sierra Club and the Center for Environmental Health for keeping these lethal chemicals on the U.S. market (California has more than 300 kinds neonicotinoids on its fields).

Nature has a wonderful alternative to man-made poisonous insecticides; it’s the magnificent Indian neem tree, known globally as ‘the village pharmacy.’

Imagine one kind of tree that offers medicine, cosmetics, rope, tea, glue, wood, fertilizer, insecticides, lubricant, lighting and heating oil, veterinary medicine and shade.

Neem is native to India and Burma. It grows from the southern Indian tip of Kerala to the Himalayan hills. It spans both tropical and subtropical latitudes, from wet tropical to semi arid regions and from sea level to an elevation of 2,300 feet. It does not tolerate cold temperatures nor saturated soils.

These fast-growing, long-lived evergreen beauties can easily reach 100 feet in height with 8-foot girths and impressive regal crowns. Their profuse white mellifluous flowers bear fruit that at first glance resembles an olive.

The fruits have a sweet pulp that is an important source of food for birds, bats and baboons. A hard shell encases seeds known as a kernel—sometimes there are as many as three kernels in each fruit.

Neem has been introduced to over 30 countries around the globe including the following states: Arizona, California, Florida and Hawaii.

For three thousand years the Indian Ayurveda shamans have known of neem’s potent insecticide and medicinal properties.

The neem tree’s remarkable defense belongs to a class of compounds called triterpenes, more specifically limonoids. At least 9 of these limonoids block insect growth.

Azadirachtin is neem’s main defense. It blocks and disrupts growth and reproduction of insects. Both meliantriol and salannin prevent insects from feeding.

Extracts of neem are effective against at least 200 different insect species including locust, mosquitoes carrying malaria and voracious Australian blowflies.

At the same time, neem extracts are harmless to pollinators like bees, butterflies, moths, beetles and bats as well as beneficial insects such as spiders, ladybugs and dragonflies, as well as warm-blooded animals and birds.

Turplex, Azatin EC, Align, Bioneem and Margosan-O are all neem-based products available in America that protect crops.

Each of us has a crucial role to play this spring to assist America’s beleaguered bees. Do not use any insecticides, herbicides, fungicides or mitcides in your garden. Place a water bowl in your yard and replenish it daily – bees get thirsty as temperatures begin to rise.

In Malibu this Earth month, please provide a safe source of nectar and pollen for the Santa Monica Mountain bees by planting a pomegranate tree in your yard. Pomegranate fruit is loaded with vitamin C, B5 and delicious, fibrous edible seeds, which will help keep your family healthy.

Australia, Radio 1, National: Ockham’s Razor

Australia, Radio 1, National, Overnight: Superstorm Sandy

Australia, Radio 1, National, Overnight: Bees and our Environment

Australia, Radio 1, National, Overnight: Great Barrier reef in Trouble

Australia, Radio 1, National, Overnight: Protecting our Oceans

Save the Oceans

Oceans Dying

Bees helping humankind

Save our Florida corals

Operation Bee founder testimonial

Earth Dr Reese Halter is an award-winning broadcaster and distinguished biologist. His latest books are The Insatiable Bark Beetle and The Incomparable Honeybee

Contact Earth Dr Reese Halter

Text © by Dr Reese Halter 2013. All rights reserved.

The provider of data-powered solutions for B2B advertisers joins non-profit Environmental Defense Fund, which concurrently signed a long-term renewal for 44,010 square feet in the building.

(Credit: hotelchatter.com)

Built in 1912, the 20-story building is located at 21st Street and Park Avenue South, nestled between the Flatiron District and Gramercy Park neighborhoods.  Landmarks and sites in the neighborhood include Pete’s Tavern, Baruch College, Shake Shack, the Flatiron Building, and the Gramercy, Union Square and Madison Square Parks.

Other tenants include Team Detroit, a division of WPP; SpaFinder Wellness; and FedEx Office Print & Ship Center.

Brian Feil, vice president of leasing for The Feil Organization and Robert Fisher represented Feil in the transaction.  Mr. Feil could not be reached for immediate comment on the terms of the lease.

Marc Ellman, president of Ellman Realty Advisors, represented Madison Logic.  Mr. Ellman could be not reached by phone and did not immediately return emails seeking comment.

The EDF plans to implement several sustainability features in its new space at the building, which features brick masonry and terracotta adorned by gargoyles and Art Deco graphics.

“This is the perfect site and perfect building for the Fund to be in,” said Robert Fisher, director of commercial leasing for Feil, the building owner and manager, in a statement.  Mr. Fisher represented ownership with Brian Feil, the firm’s vice president of leasing.

“We have a great location near Union Square and Gramercy Park and 13.5-foot ceilings that offer extraordinary amounts of natural light and spectacular views of Gramercy Park,” Mr. Fisher added.

The EDF is a national organization that seeks to create transformational solutions to the most serious environmental problems by linking science, economics, law and innovative private-sector partnerships. It has been a tenant at 257 Park Avenue South, also known as the Gramercy Park Building, since 1996.

Built in 1912, the 20-story building is located at 21st Street and Park Avenue South, nestled between the Flatiron District and Gramercy Park neighborhoods.  Landmarks and sites in the neighborhood include Pete’s Tavern, Baruch College, Shake Shack, the Flatiron Building, and the Gramercy, Union Square and Madison Square Parks.

Other tenants include Team Detroit, a division of WPP; SpaFinder Wellness; and FedEx Office Print & Ship Center.

Alan Desino, executive managing director of Colliers International, represented the EDF.  Mr. Desino was unavailable for comment.

Mr. Feil did not immediately return calls seeking more information on the lease terms.

KNOxOUT Paint is the only paint in the world that actually cleans the air. Through the proprietary application of a special formulation of TiO2 (a common pigment used in most paint) a chemical reaction is set up that removes pollutants including NOx from the air.  The great news is that this is done by the creation of free radicals, with energy supplied by the sun, and atoms in the air. It does not create any volatile by-products, and it does not break down the paint.

For more information please visit http://ecodistributioninc.com/   

Look how it worked in Manila: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-17751777

‘Paint Edsa Green’ project starts

May 09, 2011

On April 24th the Students for a Sustainable Campus committee at the CEC hosted a panel discussion titled “Climate Change in Texas: Risks and Opportunities”.

We were fortunate to have the panel moderated by the former Mayor of Austin, Will Wynn who was instrumental in turning Austin into a model for more environmentally friendly cities. The panelists ranged from academics to community and national leaders and included: Dr. Kerry Cook from UT’s Jackson School of Geosciences, Dr. Ramon Alvarez from Environmental Defense Fund, and Mr. Zach Baumer from the City of Austin.

Avoiding the typical doom-and-gloom that is often associated with talks about climate change, this panel instead focused on both the positives and negatives of climate change in Texas.

They called attention to the different economic opportunities that Texas can take advantage of if we are willing to invest more heavily in renewable energy technology, which will likely see a tremendous increase in demand as climate change progresses while at the same time also addressed the likely effects of climate change on Texas agriculture and water scarcity, including climate change’s impact on existing drought conditions.

Dr. Alvarez made a point of mentioning the fact that emissions reductions and environmental protection are not strictly about the environment, but have social equity, public health, and economic implications as well.

In the end, one of the key messages from the panel was: If we really want to build an inclusive, broad environmental movement, we have to learn to talk about the environment in a way that doesn’t alienate conservatives or climate change skeptics.

For an awesome article about the panel in the Daily Texan read here!

]]> http://supplychainmit.com/2013/04/29/delivering-green-three-case-studies-in-low-carbon-logistics/ Mon, 29 Apr 2013 20:55:44 +0000 mitctl http://supplychainmit.com/2013/04/29/delivering-green-three-case-studies-in-low-carbon-logistics/

Caterpillar is the subject of one of three case studies that show how supply chain management can support both environmental and financial goals.

Supply chain sustainability projects are often sold on the argument that going green makes good business sense. Here are three case studies that offer clear, irrefutable evidence that sustainability and profitability can be compatible in the supply chain domain.

Logistics is a leading source of carbon. Nearly 6 percent of the greenhouse gases generated by humans come from the flow of products to consumers. Reducing these emissions takes more than setting goals; it requires clear, measurable initiatives that hit sustainability targets while delivering lower costs and higher service levels.

Sponsored by Environmental Defense Fund (EDF), MIT CTL worked alongside three US companies to help them quantify the carbon footprint of some of their logistics initiatives. The goal was to document the projects, and illustrate to other companies that it is possible to reduce cost and become more environmentally friendly. Here is a summary of each project.

Ocean Spray: Leveraging Distribution Network Redesign

In this case study we present two Ocean Spray initiatives – distribution network redesign and intermodal shift from road to rail – that in combination led to a 20% reduction in transportation CO₂ emissions, while achieving comparable cost savings across the transportation network.

Ocean Spray, CSX (the rail operator), and fruit shipping companies partnered in order to enable Ocean Spray to ship more products intermodally from its New Jersey distribution center to the company’s Florida facility. Prior to the collaboration, these boxcars were returning empty to the Florida region. Shipments that shifted to intermodal generated 65% less emissions while saving over 40% of transportation costs.

Ocean Spray added new manufacturing and distribution capabilities in Florida to support the company’s growing customer base. To fully and effectively utilize these additions, Ocean Spray conducted a national network re-design project to determine which customers will receive product from the new location. Ocean Spray projected that over 17% of the total shipments will be served from the new facility.

Caterpillar: Light-Weighting and Inbound Consolidation

In this case study, we analyzed the inbound shipping operations of Caterpillar’s North American large mining truck facility to determine – based on weight, packaging, routing, and scheduling – opportunities to streamline shipping protocols, and thus reduce carbon emissions associated with the supply chain. When combined, the streamlined shipping and packaging efforts could reduce Caterpillar’s overall carbon emissions by 340-730 tonnes of CO₂ per year.

Caterpillar uses steel containers to transport parts, and the company has been working for the past four years to phase out these steel containers and replace them with plastic containers, which weigh considerably less.

To construct the very large vehicles used in the mining industry, parts are shipped from all over the globe for assembly at Caterpillar’s manufacturing facility in Decatur, Illinois. We analyzed historical shipment data to identify areas where shipments could be consolidated to save fuel and reduce vehicle CO₂ emissions.

Boise: Leveraging Rail Direct Service

Boise Inc. has launched two initiatives to improve its logistics operations and environmental performance. The Carload Direct Initiative is shifting product transport to rail, and the Three-Tier Pallet Initiative is increasing railcar utilization. Both initiatives have resulted in a combined 62-72% reduction in the company’s CO₂ emissions, as well as cost savings on those shipments.

Traditionally, manufacturers use trucks, or a mix of trucks and rail, to transport their products to customers. As trucks produce greater emissions than trains, a logical way to reduce emissions is to minimize the use of trucks and maximize the use of rail. Boise coordinated with its customers to promote rail transport so that product could be sent directly from the manufacturing plant to the customer’s warehouse. The transition from using a mix of truck and rail to exclusively rail eliminated more than 2,600 tons of C0₂; the equivalent of saving over 264,000 gallons of fuel consumed by road vehicles.

Prior to this project, railcars were loaded two pallets high, leaving a space from the top of the second pallet to the roof of the railcar, thus under-utilizing the full capacity of the railcar. Boise redesigned its pallets and loading structure by creating a half-pallet, which allowed the company to rethink pallet stacking and maximize shipping capacities for its loads. These redesigns maximized carloads by reducing the number of shipments required to deliver product. Using just 930 railcars in 2011 reduced the company’s C0₂ emissions by 190 tons, which is equal to the C0₂ emissions from 21,637 gallons of fuel consumed by road vehicles.

Results like these can persuade even the most skeptical executives that a greener supply chain delivers green.

By Dr. Edgar, Research Director, Carbon Efficient Supply Chains Research Project, MIT CTL, and co-founder of the LEAP consortium, eblanco@mit.edu. The case studies described in this post are available here.

From Huffington Post, April 25, 2013 (Full Moon and partial lunar eclipse)

Beekeepers and concerned citizens from across the UK have formed a united front in the ‘War Against Nature’ to protect bees against a devastating new group of pesticides.

On Friday morning (April 26, 2013) at 11 am they will descend upon Parliament Square, Westminster, London to show their solidarity and voice their concerns.

To grab the weekend headlines and pile the pressure on the Rt Hon Owen Paterson MP, Secretary of State for Environment and Rural Affairs, ahead of a vital European Union (EU) vote banning neonicotinoid pesticides on Monday 29th April. Even the House of Commons Environmental Audit Committee has concluded certain neonicotinoids are harmful to bees and The March of the Beekeepers will show Mr Paterson the full weight of public, expert and Government opinion and persuade him to now support a European ban.

In January and February most UK garden stores banned the sale of neonicotonoids. In America, according to the Xerces Society’s report some commercial neonicotinoid products available at garden centers are 120 times higher than those applied on agricultural fields.

The EU had proposed that its member states stop using neonicotinoids including sprays and prohibiting sales of seeds treated with these chemicals. The three insecticides in particular identified are clothianidin, imidacloprid and thiametoxam. An EU vote in Brussels on March 14 resulted in a stalemate, and this time protesters are counting on Britain to help ban neonicotinoid pesticides.

The UK is experiencing a 50 percent drop in bee populations over the past 25 years. Bees are crucial for pollinating the lions’ share of over 205,000 flowering plants around the globe. The health and well being of wild bees and honeybees are of vital importance to the food we eat including honey; the clothes we wear because cotton is bee pollinated; the beeswax we use in many products; and the potent pain medicines in Apis therapy that honeybees provide us.

Avaaz, Buglife, Client Earth, Environmental Justice Foundation, Friends of the Earth, Greenpeace, Pesticide Action Network UK, RSPB, Soil Association, The Natural Beekeeping Trust, The Wildlife Trusts and 38 Degrees will all be in attendance.

Beekeepers with smokers (not lit), flanked by supporting celebrities, people wearing beehive hair, carrying flowers, apples, pears and other pollinated vegetables, honey and jam, a giant Winnie the Pooh.

The EJ Foundation says “It’s a serious issue but it doesn’t mean you can’t have fun showing you care. Put your hair in a beehive perhaps or get dressed up in bee stripes.”

For more information contact march@ejfoundation.org

On Monday April 29, 2013 in Brussels the committee voted and the three neonicotinoids in question will be banned.

Australia, Radio 1, National, Overnight: Superstorm Sandy

Australia, Radio 1, National, Overnight: Bees and our Environment

Australia, Radio 1, National, Overnight: Great Barrier reef in Trouble

Australia, Radio 1, National, Overnight: Protecting our Oceans

Australia, Radio 1, National: Ockham’s Razor

Save the Oceans

Oceans Dying

Bees helping humankind

Save our Florida corals

Operation Bee founder testimonial

Earth Dr Reese Halter is an award-winning broadcaster and distinguished biologist. His latest books are The Insatiable Bark Beetle and The Incomparable Honeybee

Contact Earth Dr Reese Halter

Text © by Dr Reese Halter 2013. All rights reserved.

Can We Afford a Carbon Tax?

A big issue right now among manufacturers and policymakers alike is whether or not to put a price on carbon.  The debate over implementing a tax to curb greenhouse gas emissions has been raging on for years with no solutions in sight.  Economists and scientists alike are conducting studies as to how a tax on carbon will affect the country’s bottom line.

In February, the National Association of Manufacturers (NAM) released a study conducted by NERA Economic Consulting.  The study examines two carbon tax scenarios in detail, a tax of $20 per ton that increases at 4% a year, and the other designed to reduce carbon emissions by a total of 80%.  The study concludes that either tax would negatively impact the US economy.

Based on the study’s analysis, both scenarios increase the cost of energy, which in turn increases the cost of American manufactured goods.  In order for America to remain competitive, the NAM contends, manufacturing costs need to remain low, and that requires low energy costs.

The report summarizes the cost of energy using both carbon tax models, and their analysis shows the price of electricity in the $20/Ton scenario jumping from 13.4 cents per kWh in 2013 to 20.5 cents by 2053.  In comparison, the baseline model predicts a price of 17.1 cents per kWh in 2053.  The 80% reduction scenario shows a much steeper increase in price to 24.3 cents per kWh.

Gasoline prices are also affected.  The model predicts a price of $5.51 per gallon by 2053 without carbon taxation.  The price rises to $6.43 under the $20/Ton model and a whopping $14.57 under the 80% reduction case.

The NAM may be right in suggesting that increased energy prices under a carbon tax will lead to economic downturn, but some economists actually disagree.  In 2011, Alan Blinder, Princeton Economics and Public Affairs Professor and former Fed Vice-Chairman wrote in the Wall Street Journal;

[A] carbon tax… should be enacted now [and]. . . ramp up gradually . . .  What’s critical is that we lock in higher future costs of carbon today.  Once America’s entrepreneurs and corporate executives see lucrative opportunities from carbon-saving devices and technologies, they will start investing right away—and in ways that make the most economic sense… I can hardly wait to witness the outpouring of ideas it would unleash.

So, perhaps an intentional increase in fossil fuel price would not only benefit the economy, but society as a whole by spurring innovation and new ideas.  There is a problem with simply hiking up the price of fossil fuels, however.  A tax on Carbon would need to be carefully calculated in order to be both effective and economical, according to Evan Soltas of Bloomberg.  Two economics professors, Nicolaus Tideman at Virginia Tech and Florenz Plassmann at SUNY Binghamton, have suggested a scenario where polluters buy bonds that represent units of pollution.  Soltas explains that this concept erases the uncertainty involved with trying to price carbon without knowing its future cost.  Bond values could simply be adjusted and the remaining principal could be redeemed when the bond matures.

The purpose of a carbon tax is to increase the cost of fossil fuels.  By making pollution expensive, a tax can motivate people and companies to conserve resources and also spur development of new and cleaner technology.   Can that happen with a traditional tax like those analyzed in the NAM study?  Or would it require a more creative approach like the one Soltas describes?

As mitigating climate change becomes an ever pressing priority, there is increased concurrence that emissions must be curbed, but disagreement still exists on exactly how to curb them.  Endangering our country’s economy at this point is unwise, but any long-term outlook must take climate change into account.

Carbon taxes in several other countries have shown little detriment to their economies and have actually helped raise revenue, which is a goal of the proposed US carbon tax.  Even California has implemented a cap-and-trade program at the state level.  There are several options the government can employ to curb greenhouse gas emissions, and a tax on carbon need not be one of them if it will hurt the economy.

What will need to happen, however, is collaboration in all levels of government to find a suitable plan of action.  Until then, there is likely to be more of the same gridlock.

Jessica Kennedy
www.ecsgrid.com

Story ran on Malibu Times Blog March 1, 2013

An Australian interviewer recently asked me, “of all the people throughout history, who would you like to spend time with?” Here’s my answer:

Leonardo da Vinci, born in the middle of the 15th century, was the founder of modern science and an interpreter between nature and humans.

He sought to understand the nature of life two centuries before the microscope was invented. He believed the earth was a living, self-organizing and self-regulating system.

Leonardo had exceptional powers of observation and a powerful visual memory. And his “sublime left hand” (as his friend and mathematician Luca Pacioli, called it) drew in excess of 100,000 drawings in more than 13,000 pages. Some 6,000 pages were preserved as manuscripts that are now in libraries and private collections. Others were preserved in larger forms known as codices, and are held by the British Royal family and Bill and Melinda Gates.

More than 100 years before either Galileo or Bacon, Leonardo developed a new empirical approach to science—systemic observations of nature, logical reasoning and some mathematical formulations, all the backbones of today’s scientific methods.

Leonardo’s uncanny ability to draw complex swirls of turbulent water and swift movements of birds was so accurate that nothing could match it until the advent of photography over three hundred years later.

He believed that in order to paint nature he must first understand it. Studying patterns in nature enabled him to transcend all boundaries.

His studies of muscles and bones lead him to invent gears and levers, interrelating physiology with engineering. His observations and recordings of turbulence in water led him to understand the flow of air, which in turn allowed him to explore sound, theory of music and the design of musical instruments.

His experiments in mathematics on continuous quantities came as a result of his incomparable drawings in nature. His science was inexorably linked to his art and vice versa.

The lists of his inventions—some 300—are phenomenal. They include small submarines for marine warfare, air bags, goggles and flippers for frogmen to bore holes in the planks of enemy ships, table lamps with variable intensities, opening and closing automatic doors using counter weights, folding furniture and a spit with variable speeds based on the intensity of the roasting fire.

As an architect he focused on design, which included villas, palaces and cathedrals, and he was often consulted as an expert on architectural problems.

In 1482 he witnessed the Bubonic Plague in Milan and quickly deduced the city’s appalling sanitation as the culprit. He submitted a proposal to rebuild the city with decent housing, shelters for animals and street to be regularly cleaned by flushing them with water.

He designed ideal cities to contain no more than 30,000 people with two levels – upper for pedestrians, lower for vehicles with stairs interconnecting them and underground canals to carry sewage away.

Leonardo worked on the human eye for more than 20 years and his research on optics, anatomy and neuroscience ranks amongst his finest achievements.

His renowned inventions of flying machines were truly amazing and all based upon thousands of hours of observing the birds on the hills outside Florence. Recently, his glider model was built and tested off the cliffs of southeastern England, and its engineers noted that it superseded the first attempts of the Wright Brothers in 1900.

His belief that all inventions came from nature’s blueprint occurred 500 years before the applied engineering field of biomimetics was created.

His love of nature and passion for all life stands as a beacon for all that is good in humankind, and I can’t help but think that even the master Renaissance designer, engineer and scientist knew so: “Read me, O reader, if in my words you find delight, for rarely in the world will one such as I be born again.”

Australia, Radio 1, National: Ockham’s Razor

Australia, Radio 1, National, Overnight: Superstorm Sandy

Australia, Radio 1, National, Overnight: Bees and our Environment

Australia, Radio 1, National, Overnight: Great Barrier reef in Trouble

Australia, Radio 1, National, Overnight: Protecting our Oceans

Save the Oceans

Oceans Dying

Bees helping humankind

Save our Florida corals

Operation Bee founder testimonial

Earth Dr Reese Halter is an award-winning broadcaster and distinguished biologist. His latest books are The Insatiable Bark Beetle and The Incomparable Honeybee

Contact Earth Dr Reese Halter

Text © by Dr Reese Halter 2013. All rights reserved.

Two weeks ago the landscape architect Martin Barry was the keynote speaker at SUNY ESF’s George F. Earl Memorial Lecture. One of the things Barry discussed was his experience creating reSITE , which is an NGO that promotes the development of more livable and eco-friendly urban cities. One of the problems Barry experienced while starting the NGO was fundraising. Barry explained that without money from federal grants or local government organizations, many NGOs turn to corporate sponsor for funding (Barry, 2013).

This contradicts the classic image of environmental activists or “tree huggers” standing in front of a factory protesting, but that was 30 years ago. Barry’s discussion on NGO funding begged the questions of why would a corporation financially support an environmental NGO and why would the environmental NGO accept a corporation’s money.

Shell, General Motors and Coca-Cola are not names that usually come to mind when someone thinks about environmentally-friendly corporations. Last April, Shell spilled over 1,000 barrels of oil in Nigeria (Vidal, 2012). General Motors produces the Hummer, which gets nine miles to the gallon, making it one of the world’s least fuel efficient cars (“Fuel Economy,” 2011). In 2005, Coca-Cola was banned in two states in India because high levels of the pesticide DDT were found in it’s products (“Pesticides in Coke,” 2009). While all of these corporations have somewhat checkered pasts for not being environmentally friendly, they also are major sponsors or partners of environmental NGOs.

In the late 1980′s and early 1990′s NGOs and corporations began working together. With the rise in popularity of the green movement, many corporations saw this as an opportunity to make a positive impact on the environment. Environmental NGO’s such as the Sierra Club and Greenpeace decided to stop fighting corporations and collaborate with them (Murray, 2011).

One of the early collaborations was between FedEx and The Environmental Defense Fund. The two organizations worked together to reduce FedEx’s carbon footprint, by developing hybrid delivery trucks.  NGOs like The Nature Conservancy and World Wildlife Federation began to receive funding from major corporations such as Shell and BP (Murray, 2011). These collaborations provided NGOs with the financial support that is required to run a major public policy campaign and corporations could become more ecofriendly and increase profits by becoming more energy efficient.

According to the Global Environmental Management Initiative (also known as GEMI), partnering with an NGO can reduce manufacturing costs for a company and increase the efficiency of production. The company can reduce energy consumption and production costs, which increases overall profit. Corporations can receive advice from NGO’s on topics that “they may not have expertise in,” such as renewable energy and recyclable materials. Both the NGO and the corporation can improve “the creditability” of each and expose both to new audiences (Global Environmental Management Initiative, 2008).

Some environmentalists claim this is just an opportunity to generate positive support from potential customers. Brendan May suggests that many of the collaborations between corporations and environmental NGOs are public relations events to gain brand support. Being labeled as environmentally friendly can garner customer loyalty and influence a consumer’s decision to buy one brand over another (May, 2011). Business journalist Johann Hari said corporations saw these collaborations as,

reputation insurance: every time they were criticized for their massive emissions of warming gases, or for being involved in the killing of dissidents, they wheeled out their shiny green awards, purchased with “charitable” donations, to ward off the prospect of government regulation. (Hari, 2010)

This relationship gives NGOs the opportunity to gain unprecedented financial support. The makers of Clorox Bleach made a deal with the Sierra Club in the 1990′s that gave the NGO a percentage of the profits made from a Sierra Club approved household cleaning product. The Sierra Club’s Corporate Accountability Committee labeled the deal as an obvious conflict of interest, but Executive Director Carl Pope accepted the agreement anyway (Hari, 2010).

There are some problems in many of these partnerships. Radical environmental groups view corporate sponsorships of environmental organizations as “selling out.” The problem NGOs must address is that their sponsor maybe responsible for the environmental damage they are trying to prevent. Environmentalist Sarah Murray said corporations could leverage their financial backing of many environmental groups to influence the NGOs policy-making decisions (Murray, 2011).

Johann Hari notes that a large portion of corporate donations given to environmental NGOs fund public relations campaigns and congressional lobbying. This money can hire more lobbyists, pay for ‘stand up dinners’ and be given as campaign contributions. Environmental groups are seen as experts in Washington that promote policies that protect nature and promote sustainability. This raises the question of whether the political influence of environmental NGO’s promote policies that improve environmental sustainability or the profitability of corporate sponsors (Hari, 2010)?

Some environmental NGOs such as Greenpeace and The Environmental Defense Fund refuse to “take a single penny from corporate or governmental sources because they maintain that it would compromise the integrity of their campaigns” (Vijayaraghavan, 2011). The recent recession has resulted in many environmental NGOs losing large amounts of money and private donations dramatically decreased. These organizations are being forced to rely on corporate donations to survive, but what can be done to ensure the integrity of these groups (Vijayaraghavan, 2011)?  What is preventing corporations from turning these environmental NGOs into small clandestine public relations and lobbying groups?

Brendan May suggests that Congress should pass legislation that makes contributions to environmental NGOs transparent and limit the amount of money a corporation can donate to any single organization (May, 2011). This would restore creditability to environmental organizations and ensure that corporations do not control the NGOs decision-making process. May argues that if political campaign contributions are controlled and monitored, why aren’t  the funding of NGOs and other lobbying groups? Without transparency there remains the possibility of corruption. Transparency would guarantee that environmental NGOs are working to protect the environment, not business interests (May, 2011).

The time when corporations and environmental activists were sworn enemies is long gone. They have now combined resources and efforts to promote sustainable development and prevent further damage to environment. Some have suggested legislation be passed to make the financial relationships between these two types of organizations transparent to ensure influence is not abused. Whether or not the intentions of both NGOs and corporations are sincere, is unknown, but since the two have begun to work together there has been unprecedented progress made in environmental protection and regulation.

Yesterday, I discussed the language used to market a book published in 1970, just prior to the celebration of the first Earth Day on April 22 of that year.

Titled Eco-Catastrophe, it is a collection of articles/essays selected by the editors of Ramparts magazine – which was produced by 1960s-era radicals between 1962 and 1975.

One of its fascinating revelations is that those people thought Earth Day was a crock – and were highly suspicious of the fact that the mainstream, establishment media was eagerly promoting it.

An Editorial included near the front of the book is worth quoting at length:

The environment may well be the gut issue that can unify a polarized nation in the 1970′s writes Time magazine. The Hearst Press sees it as a movement “that could unite the generations.” And the New York Times solemnly predicts that ecology “will replace Vietnam as the major issue with students.”

…the organizers of the officially-sanctioned April 22 [Earth Day] Teach-In movement are doing their best to give life to the media’s daydream…

We think that any analogy between what is supposed to happen around April 22 and the organization of the Vietnam teach-ins is obscene. We think that the Environmental Teach-In apparatus is the first step in a con game that will do little more than abuse the environment even further.

…The orginators of the Vietnam teach-ins worked at great odds and against the lies and opposition of government, university administrations and the media. They raised their own money and had offices in student apartments or small storefronts. “Earth Day” came to life in the offices of Senator Gaylord Nelson, received blessing from [President Richard] Nixon’s Department of Health, Education and Welfare, was funded by foundations, and has worked out of facilities lent by the Urban Coalition.

Vietnam protesters had to create their own reading lists…The Environmental Teach-In comes pre-packaged; a well-paid and well-staffed national office sends local organizers an official brochure…Friends of the Earth (FOE) provides, through Ballantine Books, a semi-official “Environmental Handbook”… [bold added]

Forty-three years after the first Earth Day was celebrated, young people assume that the history of environmentalism is similar to that of other protest movements. They attempt to ennoble their cause by drawing parallels with the struggle for civil rights, imagining that they themselves are speaking truth to power.

But it was clear to at least some 1960s American activists that the green crusaders were playing a totally different game. The environment has always had friends in high places – politicians, journalists, and charitable foundations that distributed grants like candy.

An article titled The Eco-Establishment, that appears on pages 15-24 of Eco-Catastrophe, points out that the “environment bandwagon is not as recent a phenomenon as it seems.” Remember, this was published in 1970.

The article alleges that green players such as the Nature Conservancy and the Environmental Defense Fund were being financially “nourished” by the Ford Foundation (whose executive committee allegedly included “polluters such as Esso”) during the the 1960s.

It further alleges that the Rockefeller Foundation (funded via the Standard Oil fortune) was also “channelling money” to “the conservation elite” more than four decades ago.

As is the case today, those elites produced research reports that were then publicized by influential media outlets. Which means that the specifics of the green agenda have been determined by well-fed, well-paid people sitting behind desks for approximately half a century.

The green movement has long been a top-down – rather than a grassroots – phenomenon. Or, as the authors of that article phrase it,

The big business conservationists and their professionals didn’t buy off the [environmental] movement; they built it. [bold added, p. 21]

Here in 2013, climate activists who know nothing about history routinely use the “you’re part of a fossil-fuel-funded misinformation machine and therefore don’t deserve to be listened to” argument.

But according to the 1960s radicals whose analysis has been preserved within the pages of Eco-Catastrophe, the environmental movement is actually a corporate scam – orchestrated by oil interests, amongst others.

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